I feel like we have been working on the letter N at tot school forever! It was sandwiched between the Fourth of July tot school week so I guess we kind of have been! Prior to this letter N tot school theme Henry could identify the letter N and say the N. He still sometimes has trouble with the lowercase n and says its u.
Main Trays
On our first tray was a number circle -- N is for numbers -- I made using a small lower case n stamp. Each wedge had a larger number of n's from one to nine. Then, there were small corresponding number cards. The goal was then to match them up.
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Henry enjoyed this activity but didn't have the patience to count all the n's. He did really well numbers one to five then got bored. I think the n's were a touch small for him as well making the larger numbers fairly difficult to count.
The second tray was his name with a bunch of circles missing and a small bowl of glass beads. The goal was for Henry to fill in the circles with the glass beads. I liked that N was not only for name but also that there is an N in his name to identify.
The first week Hen was much more interested in dumping the beads between the bowl on tray two and the cup on tray one. But, by the second week he was a pro at filling the circles in.
The final tray was a nuts and bolts tray -- N is for nuts! This was Henry's favorite tray of the week. In one bowl were a bunch of large bolts and in the other a bunch of large nuts. The idea was for Henry to spin several nuts on to each bolt.
This was a really big challenge for Henry, and it surprised me that he worked so hard at it. Even by the end of the week, he still needed a lot of help getting the nut onto the bolt. He would twist in both directions at the same time therefore making no progress. Anyway, he enjoyed the challenge, and these large bolts ended up being perfect for his little hands.
The sensory bin this week was a total bust. It was relatively full, but still Henry ignored it, which almost never happens. I think he really enjoyed the trays and focused more on those.
Other Trays
Nest Making Tray: I added some Spanish moss, some sticks and an egg to a tray along with a book about nests and let Henry go. He loved this and we spent a lot of time crafting nests for this little egg.
Number Dot Stamping
Dry Erase Number Tracing: This was another favorite activity. I spent a lot of time encouraging good pencil grip this week.
Letter N and Numbers Magnet Board
